


Queen of the Keep (And My Heart)

by Sheep_with_teeth



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medieval, F/M, Pining, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:29:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28420980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sheep_with_teeth/pseuds/Sheep_with_teeth
Summary: Nora Valkyrie, of Valkeryie Keep, announces her engagement to Lie Ren. Wizard-in-training Oscar is happy for her. He always knew it was impossible for them to be together, but then he overhears something which reminds him that life is unfair for everyone.This ship is called Queen Of The FarmHouse and no one can tell me otherwise!
Relationships: (one sided), Lie Ren/Nora Valkyrie, Oscar Pine/Nora Valkyrie
Kudos: 6





	Queen of the Keep (And My Heart)

Oscar gulped down his second glass of beer, the yeast rising to coat his mouth, the liquid cooling and warming him at the same time. It was his first indulgence in months. Ozpin asked that Oscar do as little as possible to dull his senses. So it was early to bed, and water at dinner and not even black tea at breakfast, unless he had to rise unusually early. 

Ozpin, like most powerful men, was a hypocrite. He drank coffee like it pumped his heart and smoked in quick, late-night moments like a guilty teenager. It was Oscar who was subject to drudergy and ‘clean living’ and working under a man who preferred to answer pertinent questions with a smile and perhaps an affectionate ‘You’ll get there’. Still, he thought it was worth it, if it meant he might be a Wizard one day. 

And if, on rare occasions, the leading family of Valkyrie Keep would host an engagement party where he could dance, drink, and eat his weight in food. 

Oscar was having a little trouble with the dancing, knowing few steps and even fewer of the young women who frequented the Keep, but the drunkenness was coming along admirably. 

Oscar stepped away from the keg to let another reveler through and directly into the path of another man. With deft reflexes the man steadied Oscar to keep him from toppling. 

“Whoa there,” Jaune said, “That might have to be your last beer.” He frowned and cocked his head. “Have we met?”

“I’m Ozpin’s apprentice. I helped him heal you when you landed here last week.” 

Jaune’s face spread into a grin. “Of course! We weren’t exactly introduced since I wasn’t up to shaking hands.” Jaune blinked a little, and Oscar got the sense the huntsman was sizing him up, though he was too nice to do an officious up and down sweep with his eyes. “Aren’t you a bit young to be a Wizard’s apprentice?”

“No,” Oscar lied, and took another drink. Most Wizards prefered to teach adults who already had a few years of hard-earned common sense under their belt. Whereas Oscar would be fifteen in a week, and had been at Valkyrie Keep for almost a year. He had no idea why Ozpin had summoned him to the Keep, but the letter arrived not three days after he learned he could use magic, and at that moment it seemed perfectly natural. Why shouldn’t all of Oscar’s wishes come true at once?

Jaune surprised Oscar by parrying his obvious falsehood with a compliment: “Well, thank you for patching me up so I could be here to celebrate with everyone.”  
“You’re close with the Valkyries?”

“Just Nora and Ren, actually. We trained together in Argus.”

“Have you been a falling-uh, wandering huntsman ever since?”

Jaune winced. “Would you believe me if I told you last week was a fluke? Hardly ever happens?”

“That’s a shame. I was up in Ozpin’s study and I had a great view-I could have leaned out and touched you when you drove your sword through that Nevermore.” Jaune had succeeded in killing the bird he rode into the Keep. Unfortunately, it had dissolved to ash while he was still fifty feet in the air. 

“Thank god you didn’t. I don’t think scaring the hell out of me would have helped,” Jaune laughed. 

Oscar heard the squeal before the thud. He turned, already smiling, to see Nora standing on the long table at the end of the hall. 

“Everybody!” Nora yelled, raising her goblet high into the air, “Everybody! You know Ren and I are engaged. You know tonight we’re celebrating, and in two months we’re getting married and celebrating again!” She paused and peered down at Ren. “Wait, if they know all that, then what did I get up here to tell them?” She stage whispered. 

Ren actually whispered something to her, and Nora whipped back to the crowd, “Right! Everyone, please thank our local wandering huntsman, Jaune Arc, who will wander no longer, or at least not till next year!”

Jaune raised his hand sheepishly as a cheer went up through the room. Having another huntsman to protect them was certainly something to celebrate. 

Nora’s nasal voice rose over the noise of the crowd once more. “Also! Also! Jaune brought news of the Branwen tribe, and they’re bringing all sorts of wonderful stuff next month!”

More cheering that faded into a buzz of excitement. Valkyrie Keep was landlocked, but near enough to the port of Argus that traders often stopped there. The Branwens were known for carrying exquisite if wildly expensive goods. They also kept questions of where they got such lovely merchandise at bay by having a good ole fashioned time. It was hard to be down when the Branwen’s were in town, though the collective hangover once they were gone tended to sour the memories a bit.

Nora raised her glass higher, yelled, “To us! Skål!” and threw her head back to drink her wine down to the last drop.

Everyone was distracted, spirits buoyed by the impossible promise Nora had made of months of joy and festivity. People had already turned to each other to discuss their plans for the coming events, but Oscar was still watching Nora. She turned and leapt to the ground. Her skirts puffed up and floated around her thighs as she fell. She didn’t merely take the hand Ren offered to steady her. She ran her fingers down his arm, over the sensitive skin of his inner elbow, before finally grabbing his hand and squeezing. 

Oscar swallowed hard. If Nora touched him like that he could never remain as impassive as Ren. His skin would crackle and he would melt at her feet with all the grace of fat on a fire. He closed his eyes and took another swig of beer, but this time it didn’t cool him. Just sent him back to months ago when he returned from spending the coldest weeks of winter with his family. 

Oscar had been in Ozpin’s study, carefully taking inventory of all the ingredients kept in the closet and huge apothecary cabinet. He wasn’t sure if Ozpin had intentionally misplaced everything during the holiday, but they could not be in more disarray if he had. Ozpin spent breakfast chatting with Oscar and lulling him into a false sense of security. As soon as the last bite was eaten Ozpin told Oscar the ingredients were a mess and promptly nipped out to go find some frost-bitten moss. 

Oscar assumed the knock at the door of the Wizard’s study was someone looking for a poultice for a stuffed nose. He was utterly unprepared for Nora to burst inside in a whirl of skirts and shouting.

“Cute boy Oz! You’re back!”

Oscar pulled himself from his chair, trying to be polite though few people in the Keep bothered with manners as refined as rising when a lady entered the room. 

He did not regret it, however, because it gave Nora the chance to hug him. Or whatever you might call lifting him bodily and blowing a raspberry on the exposed skin of his neck.

Oscar almost didn’t notice the belated present she handed him when she set him down. He was flushed and dizzy, and not merely because Nora had spun him around. 

The present was a scarf, thick and soft, never worn but hoarded under his pillow. He would lay awake and tentatively touch it, wondering what Nora might give him next year or the one after. She said she wanted to make him something better, ‘But you’re still growing! At least, I hope you are!.’ Oscar normally hated jabs at his height, but Nora spoke with such good cheer he thought the strength of it alone might bring him to another growth spurt.

Of course, Oscar could dream about gloves and sweaters from Nora all he liked, but nothing more. Not with her getting married. Not with the way she looked at her fiance. 

“They’re very much in love,” Oscar assured Jaune once he had lowered his glass. 

It was only himself he was comforting. Jaune had disappeared. 

Oscar blinked, and the room kept on fluttering after his eyes were firmly open. Maybe this should be his last beer. He considered the bottom of the empty glass, tongue darting out to catch the last drop of foam on his lips. Ozpin would probably let Oscar drink at the wedding, but he wanted to be just a touch dizzier before he cut himself off for the next two months. 

Oscar bypassed the busy beer kegs, looking for the weak ale he had helped Ozpin set out earlier that day. (Alcohol is something like alchemy, after all, and best left to the professionals, if you have any on the premises). He found it shoved to the front of the hall, on a table by the doors. They were flung open so the cool night air could reach the depths of the great hall, but to Oscar the purpose seemed to be allowing the warmth and light of the revelry to spill outside. Oscar stepped out and turned around to watch the party. It glowed fit to light up the dark sky, burning away so much as the threat of Grimm. 

Oscar heard a  _ clink _ . It might not have signified, but it was clearer than the slightly muted sound of the party. Whatever had made it was also outside, and nearby. Oscar walked along the hall’s wall to the nearby stables. Not the stables proper, but a short row of stalls boasting a half empty trough and musty straw. These were for when someone, such as a messenger or huntsman, wanted to put their horse up and retrieve it quickly.

There was a lamp in one of the stalls, and Oscar could make out Ren’s silhouette. He ducked back, but stayed close enough to hear the conversation he had stumbled upon. 

“Let’s drink to Phyrra,” Ren said. 

“Nora should be here for that,” Jaune said. Oscar would not have considered it a weighty sentence in isolation, but Jaune almost sounded like he was scolding Ren.

Ren let lose a gusty sigh, dutifully playing the part of a petulant child. “Nora is going to be here for everything. Every day of my life. Can I at least drink and remember an old friend without her?”  
“If this isn’t what you want, why are you marrying her?”

“It’s almost what I want. I want my people to be happy. I want Lie and Valkyrie to be connected, strongly, tangibly. I want to make my parents happy.”

Oscar dared peer around the edge of the hall again. Jaune was leaning against a wall, Ren’s back was to Oscar. His shoulders slumped. For all he spoke of triumph, his posture was that of a man defeated. 

Jaune took a sip from the fancy, tiny cup Ren had been drinking from all night. Oscar thought it must be strong alcohol to warrant such a small porcelain vessel, and Jaune’s flush and sputtering confirmed it for him. 

“Damnit, Ren,” Jaune coughed, “What do you actually want?”

“Is it so wrong to want nothing at all?!” 

Oscar knew he should hide again, but he was frozen in place. He had never seen Lie Ren angry before, and even in such a brief moment he realized Ren was much like whatever he was drinking: Delicate looking, but searingly powerful. 

Even Jaune seemed surprised by the outburst, but then his gaze slid down to his feet. His sadness apparent even to Oscar. “If only we could change places, huh?”

Ren’s anger vanished, replaced by honest chagrin. He hadn’t meant to hurt Jaune, however he had done it, but Oscar wasn’t interested in the apologies he sputtered. 

Oscar staggered back into the hall. Without drinking another drop he had passed the invisible threshold from pleasantly intoxicated to queasy. He wasn’t meant to see that, the man behind the curtain. 

Oscar headed to the end of the hall where he could enter the kitchens. From there was another, smaller courtyard and next thing he knew he would be in his room in the tower.

But that route sent him past the table of honor, where Nora sat, deftly entertaining five people at once. Oscar meant only to glance at her, but she emitted gravity like a distant sun, and he found himself at her side. 

“Oz!” Nora always seemed delighted to see him. Was that a lie too?

Nora’s brows drew together in concern. “Are you alright? You look funny. Here, sit!” She patted the seat beside her. Ren’s seat. 

Oz sat heavily and smiled. Or tried to. Suddenly the simple gesture was as terrifyingly complex as dancing. “Congratulations!” He said, trying to match Nora’s energy. 

Nora leaned over and felt his head as though he might have a fever. Clearly he had been unable to feign her level of enthusiasm. 

“I’m fine,” Oscar said, though he was disappointed when she removed her hand. “Just had a little too much to drink. I was going to go to bed, but I realized I hadn’t congratulated you.”

Nora’s smile could stop a Grimm in its tracks. It certainly made Oscar feel rooted to the ground. “Thank you,” She said, and Oscar could not doubt the sincerity in her voice. Nora, he knew, would not waste her excitement or gratitude and certainly could not fake it. 

“Is it true brides are lucky?” Oscar asked, not sure where the question had come from, but unable to stop talking. 

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that, O Great Wizard?” Nora replied, wiggling her fingers mystically as she lobbed the title at him. 

Oscar laughed. “I’m only asking because I-I heard it’s lucky to kiss a bride. It means you’ll make a good match.”

“Then why don’t you have to kiss ladybugs or bouquets? I think someone made that up just so they could kiss a bride.”

Oscar was fairly sure he was turning a shade of scarlet that could not be played off as drunkenness. Of course his subtlety was completely transparent. 

“But alright!” Nora said, oblivious to his embarrassment. She leaned over the arm of her chair and turned her cheek to him. 

Oscar was so close to Nora he could see the peach fuzz on her cheek and smell ozone and sweet wine. He put one hand on her other cheek to steady himself and pressed his lips to her face, gently. He tried not to linger but allowed the moment to wash over him and stamp itself firmly into his mind. 

He couldn’t quite breathe when they broke apart. It reminded him of the moment when he groped for a towel that wasn’t there after washing up before dinner. When he looked at his wet hands and wished they were dry an orange green flame appeared in his palm. It vanished instantly, but it was a wish granted.

Kissing Nora, sitting in her fiance's chair, Oscar felt so close to having his newest wish. It was like viewing his desires through a thick sheet of glass. There was a pretty diamond pattern of steel across it as well, making it very clear how useful a well placed rock wouldn't be.

“Thank you,” Oscar managed, wishing he knew the magic it would take to convey all his twisted, elated feelings to her. 

Nora laid her hand on Oscar’s shoulder. “I don’t know if I’m lucky, but I hope you find someone to love the way Ren and I love each other.”

Oscar must have thanked her again, because he managed to reach his room without seeing Nora cry. There was no way to tell her what he had heard without making her cry, so he didn't.

He only wished he could tell her that her wish had already been granted.


End file.
